Goldfield mystery

Sweet Adeline: The Hunt for a Forgotten Gold Reef

A few old map marks, a rare newspaper clue, and three attempts to find a forgotten reef.

01 - The map marks

Have you ever glanced at something and never been able to shake the thought from the back of your mind?

For a while this was a few mine marks on a map from, I believe, 1907. It was in a boundary labeled 'Adeline Reefs'.

I had seen the name before but, in the grand scheme of history, it was seemingly unremarkable. There's a lot written about many other claims, but not much on Adeline.

02 - The clue

Adeline did, however, have a strange habit of appearing just enough to keep me interested, but never enough to reveal her secrets.

My interest was multiplied when I came across an old newspaper clipping. The article said they had stumbled across visible gold on the surface of the reef at Adeline.

This is quite rare for the type of gold that is found around here so now I absolutely had to have a look.

A newspaper clue mentioning visible gold on the reef.

03 - First attempt

Now I like finding stuff and don't mind a bit of a bush bash, so with a rough idea I headed out with the dog.

I definitely got to the right area but the ever increasing difficulty reminded me that a couple marks on a 100 year old map and an area being remotely walkable are two entirely different things.
Clearly, this wasn't the way in, I always think to myself that they had to bring serious gear with them so the proper way must be easier.

Many times I take the hard way to find something and from there can see the way they actually accessed the site over 100 years ago.
I did however find some shedding quartz on this mission.

I declared this must indeed be Adeline quartz. Some success.

Shedding quartz found on the first mission.

Oh, and a sweet pool which I will be back to swim in. The dog beat me to it.

04 - Two sets of eyes

A while later I managed to graft an afternoon out back on the hunt, this time with a friend Alex in tow.

I figured two sets of eyes would be better than one if mine even count as a full 1 at this point.

We found a great old track I have never seen on any map, this track was a link between the round the mountain track and the old dubbo track.

The old track between the round-the-mountain route and the old Dubbo track.

We didn't find Adeline. However Alex was now invested in this mystery as well.

05 - Three sets of eyes

Eventually another afternoon came around, Adeline was calling again. Alex was on board and also another friend Brendan was tagging along. 3 sets of eyes! Surely!

This time we were looking roughly in between the previous two spots and going back and forth over some very rough terrain.

I stumbled on something, at first it didn't look like much. A gently slanted patch of ground, some old trees, a depression filled with ferns.

But my spidey senses were telling me it wasn't natural.

06 - There she was

Following the slope down for a few meters I found proof it was man made. When the slope encountered a small hump a perfect cutting had been made to let the straight angle continue. Someone had moved a lot of earth.

This was exactly the sort of thing that would have been needed to move the aforementioned serious gear back in the day. Following this down we came across an impressive surface drive, perhaps this is even the spot the newspaper article was talking about. A lot of work had been done here.

Further down was an adit that was far too high to be the mine marks on the original map but exciting nonetheless.

Further down with a last bit of scrambling... In the heavy rain, oh did I mention it was absolutely bucketing down at this point...

Totally worth it. There she was. Adeline.

07 - Rails and a cart wheel

Over a hundred years ago someone stood in this exact spot, looking at the same hillside for the first time, probably with the same wet feet, hoping this would be the place that would change their life.

We searched and apart from the obvious mine at the bottom of the track with a nice flattened area out front we found another across the creek with rails and even a cart wheel, secured in time by a decent tree root.

Rails and a cart wheel, secured in time by a tree root.

08 - Still keeping cards close

There should be another entrance further upstream but this was not found on this trip.

A part of me was relieved, I feared if I found everything on this trip the desire to come back might be weakened.

But for now, Adeline was still keeping a few cards close to her chest.